On the surface
it’s hard to tell
that my loathing
isn’t personal
it’s a pervasive
all consuming beast
hell bent on shredding
every ounce of inhumanity
determined to compost all lies and
ready to food process all oppression
into convenient lozenges you can
suck on to remind you that this
shrill, loud woman will
personally pound
you into civility
if you don’t
have the brains
to play nicely
with others.

Tamara Fricke is the 2010 co-winner of the Gertrude Claytor Award of the Academy of American Poets and is previously published by The Lyon Review, Meat for Tea, Attack Bear Press Poetry Vending Machine, Whisper and the Roar, We Will Not Be Silenced, and has been included in a number of compilations.  Her poetry chapbook Our Requiem was released in 2014.  She lives in Springfield, MA, with an ungrateful cat, where she writes grants professionally.